Per Contra An International Journal of the Arts, Literature, and Ideas

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issue 34 > poetry

  • Envying Vishnu

    by Astrid Cabral. Translated by Alexis Levitin.

    I will never escape
    envying Vishnu
    his multiple arms.

    More…
  • Obstacle

    by Astrid Cabral. Translated by Alexis Levitin.

    Because of poetry
    beans burn
    milk spills
    change is forgotten

    More…
  • Cross-eyed Ways

    by Astrid Cabral. Translated by Alexis Levitin.

    We poets
    live a life
    like anyone else
    except for our

    More…
  • Domicile

    by Charles Cantalupo

    Night of the first freeze and I rush out to cover our annuals –
    Coleus, elephant ears, impatiens, other things I bought
    Over the summer but now I can’t remember what they’re called:
    No more exotic than Strobilanthes and Draceana,
    Persian Shields, Green Spikes and Hypoestes all polka dotted.

    More…
  • Cogitation

    by Kelly Cherry

    To think is to be, said Descartes,
    but maybe not, maybe to be
    is to think,

    More…
  • We Pray for These and All

    by Kelly Cherry

    worms that plow the earth
    minerals buried dark-deep in time
    reclusive fossils and those
    that never formed—life
    that left no mark, none
    not even a signature X

    More…
  • Blowback

    by Kelly Cherry

    Rich and strange as a sea-change is outer space,
    where energetic electrons blown back to earth
    pitch streams of ionized gas toward the poles.

    More…
  • Advice for My Comrades

    by A.M. Juster

    “Farewell” is hard until you try it,
                as when we gave up on gluten.

    More…
  • Loot

    by A.M. Juster

    I was finishing my toast
    and an article in the paper
    about piracy of luxury products
    when all of a sudden I could not dislodge
    from my mind this vivid image
    of a leering sociopathic captain
    decked out in Johnny Depp black

    More…
  • Why Verse Should Be Free Range

    by A.M. Juster

    It seems ridiculous
    to write free verse.

    More…
  • You and I at Breakfast

    by A.M. Juster

    Our solitary goldfish is mouthing
    something I can’t quite discern
    despite my close attention.

    More…
  • The Purpose of Good Fences

    by A.M. Juster

    I spent the afternoon laconically
    fixing pickets on my fence
    to keep out poets.

    More…
  • Emily Dickinson's Restraining Order

    by A.M. Juster

    It arrived around 9:30 a.m.
    while I was in the kitchen
    waiting for my toast

    More…
  • When All Becomes No Where

    by Sandra Kolankiewicz

    In my dream I heard a bird that sounded
                like a child calling, “Mom! Mom!” like she used
    to do when I wasn’t paying attention.  

    More…
  • Bad Company

    by Sandra Kolankiewicz

    High above the Kentucky blue grass, you
    were letting someone down, turning a
    person in, drawing a soul up a path

    More…
  • The Invisible in the Unexpected

    by Sandra Kolankiewicz

    What are they telling me that I cannot
    hear, see only the sun appearing to set  
    on the wrong side of the house as if the
    earth has shifted since I took my nap and woke 

    More…
  • the gods again

    by Donald Kuspit

    they disappoint,
                        words being worthless
    to them,
            frozen buds being more brittle.

    More…
  • new gods i

    by Donald Kuspit

    O bless the old staleness
                                         with fresh light,
    become the innocence
                            in emptiness,
    the eternity
                history forgot. 

    More…
  • new gods ii

    by Donald Kuspit

    O the misery of meaning,
                                    when you have none,
    only presence,
                      in the blink of an eye,

    More…
  • new gods iii

    by Donald Kuspit

    you become clear
                            with the final folly
    of it all,
                  the spark of intuition
    still flickering
                            in the ashes
    of ancient thought,

    More…
  • in homage to death xx

    by Donald Kuspit

    the gods in their glory,
                                    i in my wonder,
    dissipate in dull thunder.

    More…
  • in homage to death xxi

    by Donald Kuspit

    folly inseparable from wisdom,
                                              silence supporting
    the burden of it all,
                                 atlas uncrushed by the inevitable,
    the myth outrunning reality,
                                        the tortoise
    always smarter than the rabbit.

    More…
  • beloved i

    by Donald Kuspit

    embrace of light,
                             you shredded my darkness,
    leaving it limping
                              in time,

    More…
  • beloved ii

    by Donald Kuspit

    you with your breasts
                                 and body
    have become my bounty,
                                  your smile
    and laughter
                    the gift of the gods,

    More…
  • beloved iii

    by Donald Kuspit

    preserved in the amber
                                  of emptiness
    you become myth,

    More…
  • My Past Lives

    by John Ridland

    Why I swim            In my last past life I was a Shetland Selkie,
                                   always amorous, always in love,
                                   swimming spirals around my Intended
                                   before we coupled. I drowned in desire.

    More…
  • Fishing for Names Dropped in the Past

    by John Ridland

    One dropped name leads to another. Who was the guy
    who used to fix our old brown Dodge sedan
    in Berkeley, on that through street parallel
    to ours––Milpas! No, that’s in Santa Barbara.

    More…
  • On The Tight-Wire

    by John Ridland

    Now I approach my Eightieth, climbing
    the rope of the years, knot over knot,

    More…
  • Funereal Hymn

    by John Ridland

    So-and-So died today,
    which is to say
    his essences,
    his seven senses––
    taste, hearing, touch, scent, sight,
    insight, and oversight––
    deserted him, they simply slipped away,

    More…
  • His Paws Upon The Dish

    by Hollis Robbins

    Erwin Schrödinger had, in fact, a cat;
    His name was Milton, and he was a stray.

    More…
  • De Guello

    by Mark Rudman

    The phone call, the plan, to reunite with your boarding school friend Rick
    who schooled you in the art of what could be done with a deck of cards,
    and go to, where else, if not, Mexico, first stop Cuernavaca, 

    More…
  • Night Train to Orivietto

    by Mark Rudman

    A woman I just spoke to, and thought I knew,
    just revealed the sources and springs of what she calls 

    a discouraged childhood.  She lives in pitch blackness.

    More…
  • Bay of Naples

    by Lee Slonimsky

    The awning matched our drinks.   Pink lemonade,
    and all before us white-frilled blue, and haze
    and just a hint of rain.  A trio played

    More…
  • Farewell Sokolievka, 1941

    by Philip Sultz

    It was thirty miles north of Uman
    where Mendl sang a melody that his
    wife often played on the piano, 

    More…
  • Fake Flowers, I

    by Alice Teeter

    One year
    your mother got tired
    of planting her garden.

    More…
  • Fake Flowers, II

    by Alice Teeter

    Your mother kept a vase
    a bouquet of silk flowers
    under a spot light

    More…
  • Panes

    by Alice Teeter

    When your mother was your age
    she lived alone, like you do.
    She walked everywhere
    and never drove,
    you don’t know where she went.

    More…
  • Four-Scoring

    by Lewis Turco

    I am feeling kind of weighty
    Since I've finished turning eighty --
    For I never should have gotten here at all.
    Poets ought to die by thirty

    More…

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